


A Vida e o Amor que Criamos São a Vida e o Amor que Vivemos

by Adsilaflower



Series: Ours is not to reason why, Ours is just to do or die [1]
Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: 1940s, Brother-Sister Relationships, Catholic Character, Family Secrets, Folk Catholicism, Foreign Language, Grandparents & Grandchildren, Great Depression, Historical Accuracy, Jewish Character, Magical Realism, Multi, Portuguese Character, Queer Themes, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Roman Catholicism, War, author is not catholic and apologizes in advance, folk magic, immigrant family, probably gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2019-02-17 17:05:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13081356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adsilaflower/pseuds/Adsilaflower
Summary: George Luz’s earliest recollection is of him sitting at the table as his grandmother prepares the chouriço for lunch.The memory is overshadowed by the haze of time and by morning sunlight filtering through the windows, but if he closes his eyes, he can still smell the fresh ground pepper and meat from the bowl on the table, his grandmother's rose perfume, see the frayed patches on the blue curtains. He hears the drip drip of the coffee in its pot.She explained how to make chouriço that day - what to say to warm the onions exactly right, charms to keep the ingredients from freezing during the winter.There is nothing George wouldn't give to be home.He just wants to be home.





	A Vida e o Amor que Criamos São a Vida e o Amor que Vivemos

_ Very soon you will find yourself at the end of a dirt road… _

 

     George Luz’s earliest recollection is of him sitting at the table as his grandmother prepares the  _ chouriço _ for lunch. 

     His mother bustles in and out of the kitchen wearing her floral apron, and his sisters follow her like little ducklings while his grandfather smokes on the back porch. Every so often the scene flickers, and his grandmother's words repeat like a skipping record -  _ Always throw the spilled salt over your right shoulder,  _ meu pequenino.  _ It is bad luck if you don’t. _

     The memory is overshadowed by the haze of time and by morning sunlight filtering through the windows, but if he closes his eyes, he can still smell the fresh ground pepper and meat from the bowl on the table, his grandmother's rose perfume, see the frayed patches on the blue curtains. He hears the  _ drip drip  _ of the coffee in its pot. 

     She explained how to make  _ chouriço _ that day - what to say to warm the onions exactly right, charms to keep the ingredients from freezing during the winter.

     In his foxhole in Bastogne, when he knows his brothers-in-arms are asleep, he repeats them over and over again, watching the frost recede, then return minutes later. The old spells of his family are nothing compared to the darkness that permeates every part of the Ardennes, a being that feels almost older than anything George has ever come across. His grandfather’s stories, if believed, invoke something far older. 

     It’s George’s fifteenth day on the front line, and all he can think about is his grandmother throwing salt over her shoulder to ward off bad luck.

 

_ A threshold into another world- _

 

     His parents don’t talk much about their life from before they crossed the ocean, but Portugal shows in every decision, action, and thought they make. 

     They raised their children Catholic in a country where it was not favored, spoke Portuguese in the face of American isolationism, weathered every remark about how they weren’t wanted with grace and ease - but George never spoke English until grammar school, and still doesn’t speak it at home.

     When they move from Massachusetts to Providence, it’s from one immigrant community to another, so nothing really changes. George imagines this is what Portugal is like, albeit a little colder.

     George is twelve when his mother begins a telephone call with a smile on her face and ends it screaming on her knees. 

     His father rushes past him, knocking the table aside, dishes falling and shattering on the floor as he runs to his wife. George’s grandmother ushers him and his siblings out of the kitchen and upstairs to her room, but he can still hear his mother wailing, accompanied by what he thinks is his father and grandfather crying. He locks eyes with the oldest of his siblings, hoping Victor might know what is going on but he looks just as lost as the rest of them. 

     (Later he learns that any family he had left in the old country is either dead or missing. That António Salazar has swept across Portugal in broad daylight and erased everything he deemed wrong or against what was in the best interests of Portugal. Neighbors who had always looked the other way when it came to the _luck_ of his family instead dragged aunts, uncles, cousins out of their houses to chants of _heretic heretic burn those witches_ _-_ )

 

_ A different world, a marvelous world... _

 

    His brothers already have jobs by the time George makes it to the sixth grade, working afternoons at Silva’s Tires. They’re the best paid mechanics because they can fix any car, no matter how damaged, something Mr. Silva marvels at every time he runs into George’s parents at Mass. 

     His older sister is a sales assistant for old Mrs. Goldman. The old widow can’t always make it down the stairs that bridge the gap between her apartment above and the store below, so Maria takes over for her here and there, manning the register while Mrs. Goldman’s boy, Daniel, runs the floor. She mentions over dinner the good fortune of the Goldmans, how they can sell anything to anyone.

     George knows Maria doesn’t really like it at the store. She only stays because she’s sweet on Daniel. One day he overhears Daniel talking to himself at the store, unfamiliar words - _ Hakreih  _ \- over pale candles and the new blue fabric Maria was gushing over the night before. 

     George doesn't stick around to listen or to watch, because the air suddenly tastes old and dry, and a sense of  _ difference _ that makes him want to throw up wraps around him like an unwanted vise. His mother sees the aftermath of it, and he thinks she knows what happened because she draws him onto her lap and begins to sing. She sings until the coldness goes away, until George feels warmth return to his bones.

 

_ A glorious world, one of infinite opportunities… _

 

     George’s eleventh year finds him sitting with his family around the old radio in the living room. Mama has the baby on her lap, while his father and brothers stand around the edges. George is old enough to realize the past three years have been hard for his family, hard for everyone else he knows. 

     The radio crackles, and everyone leans forward in rapt attention. Roosevelt sounds younger than George imagined. His mind wanders. 

     He knows the Luz family is lucky, because his father still has a job and his mother gets discounts at Aaron’s Deli and all their clothing looks as new as they day it was made. His sister Victoria has just gotten a scholarship for college. But the Afonsos have moved away and the Da Rochas have moved in with the Rozarios and every day a new “Closed” sign appears in another window. 

     George wonders how much of his family’s comfort can be attributed to good fortune. He thinks instead, it comes from the unfamiliar words his mother says every night when she thinks everyone else is sleeping, or the charms he sees Maria sew into every stitch of their clothing, or the hours his grandmother spends on her knees before the cross. The women of his family have always done what has needed to be done.

     His father was a university man, his mother a woman of great knowledge, but only one of their children makes it to college. George doesn’t even make it to high school graduation. His family isn’t poor - not in the way that the people are in the third page of the newspapers George nicks every Saturday - but enough that his mother frowns whenever she lets out the hem on Dorothy’s dresses, or his grandmother grimaces as she darns a sock for the fourth time, or Maria’s quiet grief after she sells the gold chain that held her communion pendant. It’s enough. 

     His father may not be happy but claps him on the back when George reports that he’s gotten a job with Mr. Mosquera fixing delivery trucks. The women in his family may not like it either -  _ seu idiota  _ \- but Maria hugs him tight when he presents her with a gold chain for her pendant. The Depression is hard for his family, but there are twelve people all contributing to making it better, so George isn’t all that worried. 

     “...Let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

     George returns to the present in that moment, because he’s never been afraid, but yeah, that sounds about right.

 

_ You’ll be standing there, contemplating your next move… _

 

     Luz means light. Illumination. Radiance. 

     His name beams through the sky. It glows from the streetlamps. His name is the effect of a raging blaze, precedes peeling skin on a summer day, warmth that is just too  _ hot _ . His name follows George throughout Toccoa, up and down Currahee.

     His name wasn’t as obvious in England, but it was still there - he saw it in the faces of the men, brothers who were not burdened by their duty but eager to start, impatient like children, grinning as they received the news that it would be they who finally cracked Fortress Europa.

     George spends the nights in Aldbourne tying spells into his boot laces, wiping grease and  _ luck _ into his rifle, and shining good health into his helmet. He spends the mornings placing kismet and happiness in the hands of Easy Company. It leaves him drained and training hits him twice as hard, but it’s worth any discomfort to see his friends safe and in good spirits.

     “What ya thinkin’ about, Luz?” The words startle George, lost in thought as he is, maudlin over a bottle of beer. 

     It’s Joe Toye, his smile a white contrast to the black grease smeared over his face. He motions for the other man to sit down beside him. “ _ In Hoc Signo Vinces _ ,” George replied. 

     Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Joe’s face screw up in confusion. A pang of guilt ripples through his chest. Joe never got much schooling and he feels less because of it, George knows. 

     He hands Joe his contraband beer. “It means, ‘in this sign you shall conquer.’” 

     “‘In this sign you shall conquer’, huh,” Joe looks down, and something akin to woe flickers across his face.

     “It was the seal of the Portuguese kings. My grandmother says it all the time.” George glances down to play with the grass, but looks up when he hears Joe repeat the phrase again, quietly under his breath.

     He looks over at George. “Let’s hope that your grandmother is right, Luz, or we’re all screwed.”

     He walks back to the air strip and George starts praying with all his might that they survive whatever hell is coming for them, starts mumbling every charm he can remember - for luck, for health, for survival, for grace. 

     His grandfather warned him magic was meant to stay within the family, that there are consequences for using it on those it is not meant to be used on. But as George looks over at Joe’s retreating back, and over to the rest of the boys -quiet and contemplative on the airstrip- he realizes he’ll take every consequence there is if it means they get out of this alive.

 

_ When a gust of wind whispers “have faith” _

 

     Malarkey’s faith is almost foreign to George. 

     The rites are similar, and what Father Maloney says works for both of them, but Malarkey’s faith is tinged with the smell of peat and rebellion, the aura of family huddled around a fire speaking a language almost dead.

     On the troop ship from New York to wherever the hell they’re going, George takes time to share a smoke with Malarkey on the ship's railing. 

     Back in Georgia, it took Luz just two days to decide that Donald G. Malarkey was a crazy son of a bitch and another two for them to become fast friends. The one thing that George cannot get over, no matter how much he likes Malarkey is that Malarkey’s faith is almost  _ wrong _ to him. The rituals may be the same but the feeling and intent is all wrong - it’s too wild, too fierce, an uncompromising force that has survived all attempts of eradication. He voices this.

     “You thought you were the only one?” Malarkey takes another drag of the cigarette. “Luz, my friend, the first time I met you, I half-decided you were the devil with the way you carried on.”

     George stares at him, feeling a little numb. Did Malarkey know…?

     Malarkey moves to flick the ash from the cig over the railing and gets up. “Maybe be a little more subtle when you do your casting, hmm? Someone’s going to wise up and burn you at the stake.”

     It takes a second for George to kick himself out of the stupor he’s fallen in. He yells at Malarkey’s retreating back. “I am being subtle, you Irish bastard!”

     He doesn’t even turn around, only calling over his shoulder. “George, even Captain Sobel was starting to pick up on the fact that nothing ever seemed to happen to you. You couldn’t have been less subtle if you tried.”

 

_ You will be frightened but you will overcome... _

 

     Ramirez is easier to be around, but whereas Malarkey’s faith feels  _ wrong, _ like stagnant water that pools around dead trees, Ramirez’s feels almost...too empty. An unstruck match.

    George doesn’t think much of it, assuming the traditions of the Ramirez family are more Spanish than Iberian, until he ducks out of going down to the pub one night and stays in the barracks to light candles as he clasps rosary beads and sings his mother’s songs. 

     He’s half in a trance when someone grabs his shoulder and pushes him to the ground. It’s unexpected in a place that George had labeled as safe, and he doesn’t have time to strike back before he’s on the floor. George looks up to see Ramirez’s face twisted into a half snarl, hand still pressing on his shoulder. 

     “What do you think you’re doing, you fucking  _ bugre _ ?” His face is almost red with rage, and George wonders if he’s about to be beaten to a pulp, if he should jump up to fight or make a grab for his bayonet, when a hand reaches out and pulls Ramirez back so hard he goes flying into the wall. 

     He sees Ramirez stand back up and George startles when he realizes it’s Liebgott facing Ramirez, his skinny frame at odds with the tension he’s carrying as he makes a move to grab the larger man and hiss into his ear. George stumbles to his feet while Liebgott shoves Ramirez to the barrack’s door before turning around to face him. 

     He takes this moment to look at Liebgott and study him, because they have never been close, Liebgott usually wandering off with the Jewish boys he came with, and he has no reason to step in on George’s behalf. 

     But he finds that Liebgott’s smile is crooked, as if he and George are in on a secret together. “Next time, maybe don’t practice around outsiders, yeah?”

     Malarkey’s warning sings in his ears.  _ Someone’s going to wise up and burn you at the stake. _

     Liebgott turns on his heel and starts walking out the door, whistling an unfamiliar tune. It strikes George what exactly the secret is. Liebgott has a sense of energy around him that George has felt before, though a little more foreign, a little more sharp around the edges, but, ultimately,  he feels like an ally. 

     And that is something George never expected. 

 

_ And begin your journey. _

 

     It wasn’t his  _ luck _ that saved him in Bastogne. It wasn’t his superior training or will or determination or name. 

     George knows this the way he now knows war. The 506th wasn’t supposed to survive Belgium and his name had no place in Bastogne and God played no part in him making it out of that freezing hell alive, no matter how many Hail Mary’s were whispered during the bitter nights.

     His grandfather died when George was young, but he still remembers the wide smile and happy eyes, a thin old voice rich with emotion. His grandfather would pull him up on his lap during the nights he couldn’t sleep, when George was still small enough that he could be picked up with ease. He would talk to him on those nights about his ancestors, people who lived long before the Church existed, and the powers they prayed to.

     “Endovelicus was the great one,  _ Jorge,  _ a  _ divindade _ of safety and health and life. With him as our father and Ataegina as our mother, we flourished, remember that.” 

_      Luck _ didn’t save him in Bastogne.

     If  _ luck _ had saved him it would have saved Skip, Penkala, Guarnere, Compton, it would have saved Joe, and… it would have saved Malarkey, too.

     What saved him was not  _ luck _ nor his name, but the old power that flows in his veins, that makes a home in his bones and has been with him since the beginning. His grandfather talked about the patron of their tribe, a being who ruled above humanity before God even existed, something that has kept watch over their family for centuries upon centuries. The God who kept his ancestors alive so that it would always have someone that believed it real. 

     George Luz. His name may have kept the frost out of his foxhole, but it was his blood that kept him alive.

     Every morning out on the cold, unforgiving front, George sent a prayer to God, asking him to spare him, to spare his friends, to let him go home - but every night, he flipped his lighter on and burnt a bit of bread for his grandfather’s god, something whose name had almost faded from memory.

     He would have frozen to death before the new year if it weren’t for that.

 

**Author's Note:**

> The title translates to "The life and the love that we create are the life and the love that we live."  
> This is not 100% accurate to the real-life of George Luz, but I did want to flesh out the idea of a religious family that has a faith that mainly works as an extension of their Catholicism, but I did write the grandfather as an "old believer" of some sort.  
> Antonio Salazar rose to power during a coup during the 1920's and turned Portugal into a pseudo-fascist state, but was neutral during WWII, and stayed mostly in power until the 1970's.  
> I also wanted to highlight the dichotomy not only between the differences in Irish/Portuguese folk practices, but the difference between Spanish/Portuguese practices, of which Portugal remained more relaxed in regards to enforced Catholicism.


End file.
